Seán Haughey (Dublin North Central, Fianna Fail)

I support this motion which heralds major amendments to the Criminal Justice Bill 2004, which will be considered shortly by the Select Committee on Justice, Equality, Defence and Women's Rights. The select committee will spend many hours debating these amendments. I hope they can be agreed and put in place in the shortest possible timeframe.

The Minister has stated that these amendments will address a wide range of important issues. The existing provisions of the Bill, together with these new amendments, will ensure that the criminal law will be updated and strengthened in several key areas. The Garda Síochána will be given powers to deal with firearms offences.

The public are seriously concerned about the scourge of gun crime and organised crime which is fuelled by the prevalence of drugs in our society. The callous murder of Donna Cleary, a young mother from Coolock, on Sunday morning, 5 March 2006, shocked the ordinary, decent people of this country. Donna Cleary was an innocent person who was shot by a drug-crazed thug while she was attending a birthday party. Her murder was a watershed, a landmark, which brought home to us all the brutal reality of gangland crime on our streets.

Donna Cleary was a popular person. Her friends admired her because of the way she dealt with the difficulties of life. Her family is held in high regard in her local community and is actively engaged in many voluntary and community organisations. With her father, she was heavily involved in the Northside and District Racing Pigeon Club.

Her family is understandably heartbroken as a result of her murder. Nevertheless, they have contacted their local Deputies to see if anything positive can come out of this awful tragedy. They wish to actively promote and support the proposed gun amnesty that is being debated in the House this evening. I congratulate them on their courage in standing up for this measure. I hope that this proposal will be successful and that it will play a significant role in ridding our cities of indiscriminate and random shootings and killings. The gun amnesty will be forever linked with the name of Donna Cleary and this will be of some consolation to her family at this very difficult time.

The Minister is proposing to introduce on a statutory basis a gun amnesty during which firearms may be surrendered to the Garda Síochána before new penalties and minimum mandatory sentences are introduced. I wholeheartedly welcome this proposal. The idea of an amnesty first gained prominence in May last year, following the murder of Joseph Rafferty. Unfortunately there are no reliable estimates from the Garda Síochána or the Department of Justice, Equality and Law Reform as to the exact number of unlicensed firearms in the State but the figure is believed to be in the thousands. The majority of unlicensed firearms are believed to be disused weapons, shotguns, hunting rifles and even antiques. The chief concern must be that these could be stolen and used in armed crime. Between 2002 and 2004, a total of 1,330 weapons were stolen. It is believed that a number of gangs involved in the robbery of weapons are renting them to other criminals.

The Minister has stated the amnesty will not apply to weapons used in crime. The guns handed over will be forensically tested to identify whether they have been used in a previous crime. I am not sure whether this would be a discouragement and I would welcome the Minister's views.

There have been a number of successful examples of gun amnesties. National amnesties were introduced in the UK in 1996 following the Dunblane tragedy and in 2003 following the murder of two girls at a new year's eve party in Birmingham. Gun amnesties were also introduced in South Africa and Ottawa. The 1996 and 2003 UK amnesties saw over 40,000 weapons surrendered to the authorities. I suggest that the period of the amnesty should be sufficiently long and that thought should be given to it. The amnesty in South Africa was extended to six months and there were calls to extend the 2003 UK amnesty from one month to two.

Youth leaders in Birmingham at the time highlighted another problem in that criminals with guns did not want to go to a police station to hand in weapons. Neutral, anonymous venues were sought. Perhaps the Minister could let us know his thoughts on this issue.

All of these issues can be thrashed out on Committee and Report Stages. I am confident that as a result of this legislative process, we can get it right.

During the Second Stage debate on the Bill, I raised the concerns of legitimate gun clubs involved in the sport of game shooting and clay pigeon shooting. I hope it will be possible to cater for their concerns as we introduce this tough new legislation.

Gun crime was extremely rare in this country. However, guns are increasingly being used to settle even minor disputes within and between criminal gangs. The shoot-out on the M50 last Sunday, 26 March, is the latest evidence of this. Those who commit gangland killings are seldom apprehended. Much gun crime is in response to previous incidents. If gardaí were more successful in dealing with preliminary incidents, reprisals could be prevented and the spiral stopped. The new measures announced in the motion will help gardaí to achieve this.

Gun crime is no longer confined to certain groups and minor criminals are increasingly becoming involved. There is a mistaken view among sections of our society that it is okay for gangland criminals to shoot themselves — some even see it as positive. That is a dangerous road to take because innocent people will get caught in the crossfire, which has happened. That is the challenge which faces us all.

Operation Anvil was launched by the Garda Síochána on 17 May 2005. This is an intensive special policing operation which is intelligence driven and focuses on those involved in gun crime of any kind in the Dublin region. This operation must continue and must be fully backed up with increased resources. Operation Anvil has had some success to date. Between 17 May 2005 and 28 March 2006 there were 1,792 arrests, 31 linked to murders, 440 for serious assaults, 414 for robbery and 907 for burglary. There were 8,347 drug searches, 873 theft related searches and 776 firearms searches, with 374 firearms recovered. Some 3,934 vehicles were seized and the value of property recovered was over €6 million. In addition a total of 4,400 firearms were seized between 1999 and 2004, according to Garda figures. The number seized has fluctuated between 700 and 800 in most years and 822 were seized in 2004, the last year for which figures are available. Airguns, rifles and shotguns account for approximately 80% of the firearms seized every year and machine guns and pistols are becoming slightly more prevalent.

There is no doubt our communities want to see more gardaí on the beat. The view is that burglaries and robberies by drug users could be prevented if the gardaí were more visible. As a Deputy it is heartbreaking to call to the home of an old age pensioner living alone to hear the tale of how his or her house was broken into and ransacked, with perhaps €300 or €400 stolen, which happens regularly. It would go a long way towards reassuring the public if gardaí were seen on the beat.

Some €1.29 billion is being provided to the Garda Síochána this year, a 13% increase on last year. There are 1,500 more gardaí now than in 1997, making a total of 12,300 gardaí. This will increase to 14,000 next year. These extra gardaí should be seen; they should be out and about and involved in our communities, in particular through the community policing programme. Local communities would get a great boost if and when this happens.

I regularly get reports from local residents to the effect that drug dealing is taking place in a certain house on a certain road. I often report such information to the Garda. It is discouraging when several months later nothing appears to have happened. I would like to know what is happening with regard to such cases. It may be that gardaí have the house under surveillance and are trying to catch the bigger fish but the public need to be reassured that if reports are made in regard to drug dealing in a house, they will be dealt with effectively by the Garda.

I welcome the new measures being introduced in regard to participation in criminal gangs. This is a complex legal issue but one which must be dealt with. There is a view that judges are imposing sentences that are too lenient and that they try to circumvent mandatory minimum sentences if at all possible. It seems many professional criminals are at large as a result. In addition, there is clear evidence that some judges have become remote and out of touch with the reality on the ground. The new amendments before us will bring into existence new legislation to try to deal with these problems. Once again, the Legislature is making its views on these issues abundantly clear.

The Minister proposes amendments to the Explosives Act 1875. These include the introduction of a new offence of possession of fireworks for sale without a licence. In addition, he proposes increases in the fines and penalties generally under the 1875 Act. I propose that the Minister goes a little further in this regard. Fireworks are prevalent in Dublin and throughout the country at Hallowe'en. I suggest that community groups, local residents' associations and so on should be in a position to apply to their local authority for a licence to conduct fireworks displays. It is obvious we need tough laws but we also need to encourage community involvement. In that regard, if fireworks are part of a community activity, a licence could be sought from the local authority. We should facilitate this development.

My final point concerns the demand for drugs. Most of my contribution dealt with the supply of drugs and how we deal with that issue. The Department of Community, Rural and Gaeltacht Affairs administers the national drugs strategy 2001-08, which incorporates the work of the local and regional drugs task forces and the young people's facilities and services fund. Through these initiatives a broad range of community and voluntary groups are funded to tackle drug misuse. We cannot underestimate the importance of this effort. It goes hand in hand with the measures we debate in this motion.

See this speech in context